noikeee Posted March 3, 2017 Share Posted March 3, 2017 Hello and welcome to the next installment in my Football Manager career series. I have just taken the plane out of England after abandoning Stourbrigde whom I took from the Conference North to the League One over the course of 13 seasons, in an interrupted Dafuge Challenge. On this next career, I will be embarking on a free journey throughout the world, pursuing one thing: recognition as the most successful Portuguese manager of all time. Evidently, there is just one slight issue that makes this a little daunting. The career of this man, crowned so many times across Portugal, England, Italy and Spain: Inspired by @AK22's legendary career overcoming Alex Ferguson's records, I will be attempting to break past José Mourinho total points in FM's Hall of Fame as the ultimate goal of this career. However, I am not obsessed by trophies and will not just blindly follow whatever gives me more change of success. I just wanna have some fun playing some good football! These are the leagues I have loaded up at the beginning: This is a lot of leagues, hopefully it's not too slow. I do not have any edited leagues loaded up at the beginning, but have a lot of @claassen's Leagues World Pack files active so I can load them up in the future if I wish so! And these are my beginning stats: Right... shall we begin? I've taken a plane to a very specific place for a slightly random, but carefully planned place to kick off a managerial career... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 3, 2017 Author Share Posted March 3, 2017 Montevideo, Uruguay - 1st of July, 2016 Welcome to Uruguay. A place I've always wanted to manage in, but somehow managed to avoid in every single of my previous careers. Not anymore. So who am I managing, anyway? They're called Central Español. I reckon FM came up a pretty decent overview of their history, so let's just load up the screenshot: Basically, a **** side who once somehow won the title in 1984 and languish in the 2nd tier these days. I directly took over the club rather than starting out unemployed, because I found their squad to be mildly fitting to a new exciting tactical system I'm trying to build: Inspired by my 3-3-2-2 with Sassuolo in the Community Formation Experiment, I'm in the early stages of building an attacking-looking 3-4-1-2, which seems like a perfect fit for South America. There are a couple of issues, however. Let's take a quick look at my squad: Loads of DMs and no MCs like I need for my new tactic! Brilliant! This is gonna take some retraining and/or new signings... These are my stars: Rated as the best player in my squad, I'm not so sure he's that great? Doesn't excel in any categories. I'm looking to play him as CB. Gonna be retrained ASAP to wingback because I like my wingbacks to be wildly offensive. I've got huge hopes for him. I guess this is where our goals are gonna come from. Goals Get the tactic working, try to understand the competition format (this league runs on "average points", wtf??), and, according to the board, "be competitive". It's nice to start with no particular pressure! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rikulec Posted March 3, 2017 Share Posted March 3, 2017 Best of luck with this, I'll be following. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
hasdgfas Posted March 3, 2017 Share Posted March 3, 2017 Ooh, a neat goal for this save. Good luck! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulHartman71 Posted March 3, 2017 Share Posted March 3, 2017 Interesting idea for a save. Will be incredibly difficult especially if your goal is to beat Mourinho's record within your save game, as he'll likely have at least 20 more years of winning trophies at big clubs/nations whilst you're playing This is his HOF score in my save in 2034. No pressure... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 3, 2017 Author Share Posted March 3, 2017 1 hour ago, Rikulec said: Best of luck with this, I'll be following. 1 hour ago, hasdgfas said: Ooh, a neat goal for this save. Good luck! Thanks guys! 55 minutes ago, PaulHartman71 said: Interesting idea for a save. Will be incredibly difficult especially if your goal is to beat Mourinho's record within your save game, as he'll likely have at least 20 more years of winning trophies at big clubs/nations whilst you're playing This is his HOF score in my save in 2034. No pressure... Honestly, it's just a bit of a gimmick to give it a theme to this career, I'm not really that focused on beating his score. But if I get the chance to do it... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 3, 2017 Author Share Posted March 3, 2017 One man down! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
argento Posted March 3, 2017 Share Posted March 3, 2017 Nice to see another South America save! Good luck in Uruguay! Hopefully you'll be mixing it with the big boys Penarol and Nacional in no time! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 3, 2017 Author Share Posted March 3, 2017 15 minutes ago, argento said: Nice to see another South America save! Good luck in Uruguay! Hopefully you'll be mixing it with the big boys Penarol and Nacional in no time! I'm not sure I'll stick around that long. But it's great to be back in Latin America, had great times managing in this region in the past! Just not in Uruguay specifically - I've done Argentina, Chile and Costa Rica. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 3, 2017 Author Share Posted March 3, 2017 July 2016 - Pre-season transfers I have spent the month of July bringing in a lot of talent into the Central Español squad: Not sure he's that much better than my other CBs at the club, but my staff love him. Think Marcelo Gamarra is ahead of him in the pecking order for WBR. Extraordinary midfielder. Absolute perfect fit for a more aggressive version of the DLP, which I think I need as my DLP is my holding midfielder. I like this guy a lot too and he should be the CM/S next to Miranda. Another alternative for midfield, think probably a backup for either the CM/S and the AM/A positions. Has been looking immense in the friendlies. PPMs make him a highly interesting alternative for AM/A as the role makes him move forward, and "comes deep to get ball" makes him drop deep too, so he just moves all over the place. A more conventional alternative to AM/A but quite possibly more talented than Advaldo. A poacher-like player with loads of pace to fit in at CF/A. Could do with more determination. I've left the best for the end. Superb forward. Can play either as the DLF/S or the CF/A. This means the squad now looks like this, and I've picked what's probably the starting 11 for now. Or would be, without the injury to Martínez: I'm rather happy. The increase in talent is enormous. Note the lack of WBLs but I'm playing Stoppiello and Flores in the position. The transfer window only closes in a little over a month but I'm not planning further transfers for now. As for the tactic, the first signs about it are... great! I almost didn't have to touch it from my initial plan on paper. Friendlies always make things look better than they are, but we beat well Sud América and Cerro who are both a division above us. That looks very promising. The shortened Segunda División season (if I understood correctly, this one runs only from August to December, because Uruguay are adjusting from European-like seasons to calendar year seasons) starts in 2 weeks time, after another two friendlies, away at Progreso. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
R7Now Posted March 3, 2017 Share Posted March 3, 2017 Well, AK's thread was one of my all-time favorites, and I've loved your previous works, so this one should be quite fun. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 4, 2017 Author Share Posted March 4, 2017 1 hour ago, R7Now said: Well, AK's thread was one of my all-time favorites, and I've loved your previous works, so this one should be quite fun. Thanks. I'm hoping it'll be fun, too. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 4, 2017 Author Share Posted March 4, 2017 August-September 2016 Transfers Left-back Brian Santos was loaned out. Competitions This was a bit of a shock. I'm quickly reaching the conclusion that the 4-3-1-2 is our bogey AI formation to come against, because that was what they fielded against us in the first 3 league matches that we lost. The first one felt unlucky, but by the third one I was noticing something was seriously wrong, and started trying to come up with an alternative plan, specifically to counter that system. Thankfully we came back with a bang, hammering Miramar Missiones 4-1, and although we went 2 goals down to Cerrito, a Federico Olivera brace equalised it, and we beat Torque big time 3-0 again - even if in this match, they switched to a 4-3-1-2 late on, and again we struggled. In this ridiculously short mini-season (single round-robin) and with just 1 team going up, losing 3 matches means we're pretty much out of contention of promotion already, if we had any hopes of it. But frankly, I'm still trying to figure out where exactly are we at, rather than thinking of getting out of this league already. Are we a midtable side? Or a side that's utter crap vs 4-3-1-2s, and great vs everything else? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 4, 2017 Author Share Posted March 4, 2017 October-November 2016 Competitions Away at Atenas, who fielded an identical 3-4-1-2 formation, it was a very even match decided by one goal for the home team, so we returned to defeats. It was an isolated case however. We were not convincing vs Canadian but never in danger of losing it and won it 1-0; and vs Tacuarembó I'm not entirely sure how did we manage to avoid to score, it finishing 0-0. November's single away match vs Cerro Largo proved an opportunity for me to unleash a new alternative plan to counter the 4-3-1-2: a 3-3-2-2 almost identical to my Sassuolo tactics. They fielded a 3-3-1-1-2 which is not our bogey formation, but I reckon it would pose the exact same issues. This switch proved spectacularly successful as we didn't concede a single shot on target and beat them easily 2-0. We sat out for the rest of the month as there was only one more fixture and it was our time to not play as this league has a odd number of teams. This is too short a season to recover from those early setbacks, and now with just 2 matches remaining - away at Villa Teresa and at home vs El Tanque Sisley, we have no chance of climbing the table much further. Still, I am now much more optimistic for the future after figuring out a strong alternative plan. I think I'm starting to settle into something nice here... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rikulec Posted March 4, 2017 Share Posted March 4, 2017 Wow, that league system is... interesting. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 4, 2017 Author Share Posted March 4, 2017 10 minutes ago, Rikulec said: Wow, that league system is... interesting. They're reorganizing from European style, start in August end in May seasons, back to calendar year seasons. So this happens to be a special 6-month-long mini-season to catch up with the calendar. Still, what they're turning it into is even more bonkers. I don't know what the format of the 2nd division will be like once this season ends, but the top tier will have Apertura, Clausura AND a mini-season in-between called the "Intermedio". From Wikipedia: Quote The season will be played under the Apertura-Clausura format, with the Apertura being played from February to May and the Clausura from August to November, and the inclusion of an additional tournament between the Apertura and Clausura named Torneo Intermedio and played from May to July. In the Intermedio, the 16 teams will be split into two groups of eight with each club facing the others in their group once, and both group winners will play a final to define the champion. All three tournaments of the season will count for the aggregate table. If the best team in the aggregate table has not won the Apertura or Clausura, it will gain a berth to the finals, but if one team wins both tournaments it will automatically win the championship. The worst three teams in the relegation table will be relegated, taking into account the 2016 and 2017 seasons. Also, the Torneo Intermedio winners will qualify for the 2018 Copa Sudamericana in case they fail to secure an international berth at the end of the season. Simple! I think @dafuge went through all this earlier in his career, he might be able to explain better. To further complicate things, here in the 2nd division there's an "aggregate points" table and I'm not sure what's it for. It sums up this season points, with the next season's points. My best guess is it will determine relegation, like they use it in Argentina - the teams with the worst points average over a few seasons get relegated. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 4, 2017 Author Share Posted March 4, 2017 December 2016 Competitions Against Villa Teresa, we finally got tested vs a 4-3-1-2 under the new plan B, and passed the exam well with an away win, even if we didn't really dominate and relied on a corner goal. For the final match, El Tanque put a massive bus in front of us, and we were fortunate that we scored in the very first minute, which made their plan crumble apart. This means we finish the season with 3 wins in a row, and no goals conceded in the last 5. Still, we only climbed up to 4th. Oh well. Considering how badly we started, I think I can be happy with that. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 4, 2017 Author Share Posted March 4, 2017 Season review 2016 It feels stupid to do a season review after 12 competitive matches, but that's how we roll here in Uruguay. Finances Oh god. This is a financial black hole. Statistics, best 11, and top 5 players of the season 5. Charles Zoryez (DC) - Decent season by the experienced centre-back. Better ratings than his partners in the CBs trio, and unlike them, he didn't even score any goal which inflates the ratings. 4. Diego Cordero (MC, DM) - An excellent signing, did much better than his MC partner Miranda who was a bit disappointing. 3. Advaldo (AMC, MC) - Proved a creative force with 2 goals and 2 assists. Rotated with Pizzichillo, however, and wasn't as well suited to the plan B 3-3-2-2. 2. Matías Quintana (GK) - Bizarre to see a goalie with one of the team's highest ratings, shows just how good he was. Lots of quality stops to good chances. 1. Federico Olivera (ST) - I was expecting our attacking line to be led by the hugely talented Cassiano, but the Argentinian poacher-like proved the real threat with 5 goals. Career progress table Season League Cups Continental Other ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Central Español (Uruguay) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2016 Segunda Div - 4th Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 4, 2017 Author Share Posted March 4, 2017 Tactics Dunno if you guys have noticed, but I'm doing updates a little different this time. Trying to make more regular updates to get the thread moving, but writing less in them to make it less of a chore. One of the changes is I'm gonna separate tactics to different posts rather than in every season review, and only talk about them when there's reasons to. Now the first season has ended, it feels like a good time to go over my 3-4-1-2 setup in detail. So this will be a special, lenghty post. Plan A - 3-4-1-2 As mentioned a few times, this is highly inspired by my Sassuolo side in the Community Formation Experiment. That was a 3-3-2-2, Control, Very Fluid, highly based on possession. It's fun but I wanted something even more attacking. The 3-3-2-2's core concept was start from a deep formation, absolutely rock solid defensively, then through an aggressive mentality get everyone running higher up from their deep positions. This is actually not too different from my 4-1-4-1 AML I had going on with Stourbridge which used a similar concept of stack up the bodies in a solid formation, then run forward from there. The challenge I gave myself here was, by turning the midfield triangle upside down, and pushing them up a strata, I now have a relatively top-heavy formation. This is new for me as I've not done it well since FM15. It implied a few changes: - Mentality was toned down to Standard rather than Control to avoid all those high up players just running into the opposition defence too soon. - However I still want offensive football therefore I added Play Wider and Higher Tempo to mimick some of the effects from Control, just not the rush to run even more forward. Play Wider helps with our otherwise narrow shape, and Higher Tempo gets us passing the ball quicker, which is vital to capitalize from any mistakes the opposition makes marking all those players we leave upfront. - The roles for the upfront trio are a fairly classic AM/A-DLF/S-CF/A with the caveat that usually people use a AF/A rather than a CF/A but I like the CF/A's extra movement of sometimes dropping deep too. However I revert him to AF/A when I'm up against a team with DMs. This trio of roles is well known as a hugely efficient way of creating goals, I've seen it in 4-3-1-2s, 4-4-2 wide diamonds etc. - Behind them I chose two screening roles for the 2 remaining midfielders, much like what I'd do if I played a 4-2-3-1. The DLP/D is a purely holding player, the CM/S can offer a little more but doesn't adventure himself wildly. I added "Moves Into Channels" to the CM/S to see if he can help out the WB/S a little more out wide, but tbh I'm not noticing many differences. - Unlike my Sassuolo tactic which is on Very Fluid, I decided to stick to Flexible, albeit with Be More Expressive as a stylistic preference, I want to see good creative football. This helps spread out all those triangles upfront between my attackers and midfielders. A concern is on Flexible compared to Very Fluid there might be too much of a gap between my 3 CBs and 2 CMs, but I'm hoping the roles I've chosen will mitigate that, specially the DLP/D. - Finally, I've decided to adventure myself with Close Down More because I think a high pressing game suits our top-heavy formation better than trying to soak up pressure. - GK retains the PI of "Distribute to Centre Backs" like I had with Sassuolo which worked so well with a back trio. - Initially I had the DLF/S and CF/A the other way around, but I found the CWB/A was awfully isolated and this way he gets the DLF/S to pass to. Plan B - 3-3-2-2 The plan A worked fantastic in the friendlies, however, as the first 3 league matches shown, there were a few serious problems when we faced 4-3-1-2s, or any other formation that fielded AMC/ST/ST (like ourselves): - The 4-3-1-2's trio of attackers (AMC/ST/ST), which is identical to ours, managed to exploit the space we leave between our duo of CMs and our trio of CBs. Specially since a 4-3-1-2 has a trio of supporting midfielders to distract our 3. Once our 3 midfielders were distracted marking their 3 CMs, we were left with their AMC/ST/ST trio pulling our trio of CBs apart, and we're all on Close Down More - it was just way too easy for them to pull our defence apart and create chances for through balls. - The fact a 4-3-1-2 has one extra midfielder compared to us, means we also struggled to ever get long runs of possession and rarely managed to attack effectively, only through sporadic counter-attacks. Which were nowhere near as effective as their through balls pulling our defence everywhere. So for these matches I'm now returning to something almost identical to my Sassuolo tactics, in the same formation: - I now have, not just an extra player in the centre (3 CBs + 1 DM vs their 1 AM and 2 STs), but we're also no longer on Close Down More. So we're much, much harder to pull apart to play those through balls in. - Exploit the Flanks tries to exploit their numerical inferiority in the wings (although it is the same for ourselves). - The rest of the setup can be explained in the Sassuolo thread as it's all so identical and basically it's the opposite reasons of everything I wrote for plan A. So I went back to Control over Standard, Fluid over Flexible, etc. This tactic is also extremely easy to switch to mid-match from plan A, probably not even needing any substitution at any time. Most MCs can play DMs, AMCs can play MCs, etc. So I feel I now have a serious base to work in for the future in this career. I'm also starting to build up a Plan C 4-3-1-2 for other special occasions (for when I feel a 3rd CB is unnecessary as the opposition is too deep), but for now this seems good enough. Provided this all works, I don't expect to need to write such long explanations in the future for any tactical changes, as I don't intend to change. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 4, 2017 Author Share Posted March 4, 2017 This isn't good, it cleans up our current balance but I prefer when chairmen donate money rather than take out loans. We already had a giant loan. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 4, 2017 Author Share Posted March 4, 2017 Geez, since we're reorganizing the league, let's take it up from 13 to 15 teams, instead of 14 or 16 or 18 or any other EVEN number that doesn't force a team to sit out each match day! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
hasdgfas Posted March 4, 2017 Share Posted March 4, 2017 5 hours ago, noikeee said: Geez, since we're reorganizing the league, let's take it up from 13 to 15 teams, instead of 14 or 16 or 18 or any other EVEN number that doesn't force a team to sit out each match day! Oh yeah, 15 teams. Perfect. Nothing could go wrong Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
MAMRICCA Posted March 5, 2017 Share Posted March 5, 2017 Welcome to Uruguay! Yeah, the league system is a total mess, usually we have Apertura and Clausura, but last season we only had Apertura in order to change the calendar for example... Good luck with your save! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 5, 2017 Author Share Posted March 5, 2017 January 2017 - Pre-season transfers A quiet transfer window so far, as my squad is getting large and I can't get rid of anyone crap. WBR Sebastián Rosano who was here on loan was returned to his parent club after a serious injury. Almost a carbon-copy of Santiago Stoppiello. I'm not 100% happy with Stoppiello's contributions as WBL so I'm hoping Moreira is an improvement. If nothing else, I got a decent backup here. With Rosano gone there was an opening for a second WBR. Not sure he's better than current starter Gamarra. Class player although the AM and ST positions are getting a bit crowded now. Not sure if he'll play more as DLF/S or AM/A. Current squad: It's pretty much the same lot isn't it. I think until a few contracts start expiring or the club starts going forward, we're kinda on a ceiling here. However, the team comparison screens now look a hell of a lot better than when I arrived, as they indicated one of the worst squads in the division. We're about par with the average now, or slightly above. One more boring friendly and we get the season rolling now in February. The league looks a hell of a lot more normal now, with a double round-robin... apart from that whole 15 teams thing. My goal is to simply get into the battle for promotion. The end of last season made me very optimistic that going up is possible. 2 teams go up directly and a 3rd gets into the playoffs so I think it's doable. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 5, 2017 Author Share Posted March 5, 2017 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 5, 2017 Author Share Posted March 5, 2017 More records. Feels good, man. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darius1998 Posted March 5, 2017 Share Posted March 5, 2017 I can explain the rules in Uruguay's top division to an extent as I managed there for a season. Anyway, here's the explanation from dafuge's thread - Starts from there and goes on for a few posts. No idea about the 2nd tier though as I've never played in it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 5, 2017 Author Share Posted March 5, 2017 13 minutes ago, DB08 said: I can explain the rules in Uruguay's top division to an extent as I managed there for a season. Anyway, here's the explanation from dafuge's thread - Starts from there and goes on for a few posts. No idea about the 2nd tier though as I've never played in it. Yeah I vaguely remembered that conversation, but thanks for looking it up. Might come in handy if we go up. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 5, 2017 Author Share Posted March 5, 2017 February-March 2017 Competitions It's a complete cleanout - all wins! And just one goal conceded! As soon as the first match finished I knew we were onto something special - 3-0 away win over a team that just got relegated from the top division, with new signings Maximiliano Moreira (2 assists) and Marcelo Fernández (penalty goal on debut) on magnificent form. As the fixtures continued to play out, we have started playing less convincingly, with several players nervous presumably due to feeling the pressure to keep on winning and playing well, but we kept on doing the business and finish March with a great 3-0 win over Deportivo Maldonado. I don't think this could've started any better... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 5, 2017 Author Share Posted March 5, 2017 I think I just witnessed the worst match of football ever. Notice particularly the total shots on target. The 2 shots on target were long shots midway through the 2nd half, and the only clear cut chance of the match, was a blocked shot in injury time. Thrilling. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 6, 2017 Author Share Posted March 6, 2017 April-May 2017 Competitions We've dropped some points! Not many but we did. Following the worst match of football ever at El Tanque Sisley, we returned to big wins, tanking Miramar Misiones and Torque, and also beating Huracán del Paso away. We conceded a rare goal away at Canadian, but came back fiercely to hammer down Cerrito with 3 goals in the first 6 minutes. There was another goalless draw at Oriental de la Paz, and it looked like going the same way vs Progreso, but we still scored twice in the final minutes to get yet another win and yet another clean sheet. I've decided to include the full league table this time, because I want to save for posterity the goals conceded column. Just look at that beauty: 2 goals conceded in 14 matches! I don't think I've experienced anything like this in any version of FM ever before. We're also on a run of 19 unbeaten matches too, by the way. We're exactly at midseason now, and the way things are going I'd be pretty disappointed if we lost promotion or even the title, although Cerro Largo are on great form as well and not far from us. However, there are a few extra problems coming our way as we're about to lose a few players... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 6, 2017 Author Share Posted March 6, 2017 Contracts expiring I think something may be a bit bugged up in the Uruguayan league, due to the 6-months catch-up season we played last year, because a bunch of contracts are running out right now at the end of June, in the middle of the season. We are at risk of losing all 4 loanee players above - and I've already dodged a bullet with a few other players we have contracted to ourselves, who renewed theirs at the last minute. The problem is that we're limited to 5 loans per season (the 5th was Sebastián Rosano who I returned to his parent club earlier). But, when I try to ask for renewing these loans, it appears to count as new ones and they're immediately cancelled. So unless something changes we will lose all of them at the end of next month. I'm not too fussed about Franco Gentile, he's barely played. Franco Pizzichillo has also been a disappointment, and even Cassiano, who on paper would be one of our biggest talents, has been average upfront, although he's still useful. The one I really don't want to miss is centre-back Yeferson Quintana who's quite simply had an incredible season, with the highest ratings of my squad by a long way: an incredible average of 7.46. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rikulec Posted March 6, 2017 Share Posted March 6, 2017 Looking very, very good so far. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 6, 2017 Author Share Posted March 6, 2017 2 hours ago, Rikulec said: Looking very, very good so far. I'm honestly kind of shocked it's been this easy. Wasn't expecting that at all. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 7, 2017 Author Share Posted March 7, 2017 A decisive match against Cerro Largo, our closest challengers in the table, was just decided by this blast from long by Maxi Moreira: Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 7, 2017 Author Share Posted March 7, 2017 Youth intake 2017 I was starting to think we'd never get a youth intake. It came in the 20th of July, right about a full season after I started my career here in Uruguay. Lombardi in particular looks class. I'm not focusing on youth much and there's a couple other almost equivalent prospects in this squad (in the reserves and U19s) that I've not been caring much about, but hey, 4+1* of PA is interesting. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 8, 2017 Author Share Posted March 8, 2017 June-July 2017 Transfers They're back! I've written more in detail in the Uruguay League Issues bugs thread, but as the loans of my players expired, turns out I could just loan them back again (although I decided to pass on Franco Gentile who I wasn't picking regularly before). Meanwhile, we sent a few kids on loan ourselves. Competitions We beat Rampla Juniors before the league went on almost a month long break. Cheers, very entertaining. On the return we had a massive match v Cerro Largo who were closing in on us, but that missile from Maxi Miranda settled it, and we were again quite lucky to scrap a late header from our defender Joaquín Martínez to beat Villa Teresa. But then, disaster struck! 2 goals conceded! A loss! Our massive unbeaten run of 22 matches is over, and the possibility of an unbeaten season ruined - with the final goal coming in on minute 91, no less. It was as if nothing had happened in the next match however, as our lads utterly dominated Tacuarembó and could've, should've scored more than 2. We've opened up a bigger lead over Cerro Largo and now, unless something catastrophic happens in the remaining final 9 matches, should comfortably go up as champions. We still retain a fairly decent record of 5 goals conceded in 19 matches, too... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
hasdgfas Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 Very impressive season so far! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bedese Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 Good luck! It's a good start I'll be following! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 8, 2017 Author Share Posted March 8, 2017 7 hours ago, hasdgfas said: Very impressive season so far! 7 hours ago, Jupjamie said: Good luck! It's a good start I'll be following! Thanks. This season has now turned almost purely into a game of "how few goals can we concede". Which is why I was so damn mad after conceding another 2 in one of the first few fixtures for the next update - taking the total up to 7. It was only 2 by midseason! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
deltablue Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 That's still an excellent defensive record I think. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 8, 2017 Author Share Posted March 8, 2017 August-September 2017 Competitions Things have started going a little wrong. We let El Tanque Sisley equalize with 2 goals in injury time, struggled to beat Depor Maldonado, then lost not just once but twice in a row. To be fair the match against Miramar Misiones was just stupid, they did nothing to beat us nevermind score 2 more than us. We just kept on struggling as teams played more and more defensively against us, and scrapped another 1-0 win over Huracán del Paso with another lone Cassiano goal, then finished September just barely equalising late in the match vs Canadian. This is clearly not our finest moment but all the advantage we accumulated earlier in the season, is paying off as we remain on a great position coming into the final 3 matches. By my math, we only need a win to get promoted, and a win and a draw to become champions. We're only limping over the finish line and struggling to cope with the pressure of expectations and ever more defensive opponents, but I think we'll make it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 9, 2017 Author Share Posted March 9, 2017 October-November 2017 Competitions We did it, but made hard work out of it. Against Cerrito, we conceded early and kept on hitting their bus head-on for the entire match, until in the dying minutes 2 tame shots from just outside the area somehow made it past their keeper, and we turned it around. This clinched promotion! Against Oriental de La Paz it was almost the exact same story - conceded early, and this time who scored from a long shot in the last 10 minutes was teenage midfielder Néstor Álvarez: his first ever senior goal gave us the title! And in the final match of the season, in a suprisingly easy 4-0 win, another teenager picked up his first senior goal of his career: defender Diego Amaro - whilst midfielder Advaldo excelled with another 2 goals and an assist. This was a fantastic season even if we couldn't fully maintain the astonishing defensive record as the season went on - still, I think I can be pretty happy with 14 goals conceded and 18 clean sheets in 28 matches... The dominant 2nd tier title makes me excited to see what can this club do in the 1st tier next year, but whilst I am enjoying it here for now, I'm not so sure this is a long term project - it was only ever meant to be a short job to kick off my career. Expect me to stay for only probably another year or so, and from there on, I am completely open with no overly specific plans, either in the Americas or back home in Europe... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 9, 2017 Author Share Posted March 9, 2017 Season review 2017 A vintage season for the club sees us return to the top tier after 4 years in the 2nd level. The spirit of Central Español is returning? Summon up the heroes of the 1984 title... Finances "Insecure", but I don't see why. A massive cash injection early in the season kept us breathing and we only just dropped into the negative balance, despite being over wage budget all year long. My wage budget has more than doubled now with promotion, too! Statistics, best 11, and top 5 players of the season The stats for my loanees are incomplete due to the loans expiring midseason, and them being re-loaned. They should read: Yeferson Quintana - 25(0) apps, 4 goals, 1 assist, 1 POM award, 6 yellows, 7.28 ratings Cassiano - 20(7) apps, 9 goals, 8 assists, 2 POM awards, 2 yellows, 6.91 ratings Franco Pizzichillo - 6(13) apps, 1 goal, 1 yellow, 6.78 ratings 5. Marcelo Fernández (ST, AMC) - Scored a lot early in the year but disappeared as the opponents started playing more defensively and not giving us space. Still finished the season as joint top scorer on 9 goals though. 4. Maximiliano Moreira (WBL) - A great signing, easily relegating Santiago Stoppiello to the bench. Great ratings and 6 assists. 3. Cassiano (ST) - The ratings aren't great, but he's finally putting his talent on the pitch - most goals (9, level with Marcelo Fernández) and most assists (8). 2. Diego Cordero (MC, DM) - Astonishing season. Much of our success relies on the duo of midfielders at the base stabilizing everything, and Cordero not only did that but further helped the attack too. 7.20 ratings are great. 1. Yeferson Quintana (DC) - Not as good in the 2nd half of the season in his 2nd loan, but his ratings in the 1st half of the season were godlike - and in that period we conceded just 2 goals in 14 matches, so you'd credit my defence. And he was my best defender. Mourinho watch It's not looking good for José at Man Utd. Just 5th in the Premier League last season, and with no other competitions next to his name (not even a semi-final presence in any cup), it was a poor year for his standards, and he's doing even worse now, 9th in the Premier League as it stands. Could the sack be coming? Meanwhile, I'm not sure he watches 2nd tier South American football, but I've just grabbed 26 points on him thanks to winning the Segunda Division. Just 2671 more to go. Career progress table Season League Cups Continental Other ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Central Español (Uruguay) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2016 Segunda Div - 4th 2017 Segunda Div - 1st Champions, promoted Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
hasdgfas Posted March 9, 2017 Share Posted March 9, 2017 You'll catch up in no time! Just do that ~100 more times and have him do nothing! Easy Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Northernpilgrim Posted March 9, 2017 Share Posted March 9, 2017 Great start and interesting idea. Will follow with interest 😃 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 9, 2017 Author Share Posted March 9, 2017 4 hours ago, Northernpilgrim said: Great start and interesting idea. Will follow with interest 😃 Cheers! 5 hours ago, hasdgfas said: You'll catch up in no time! Just do that ~100 more times and have him do nothing! Easy Hey it's a start! And I can now say I've won a trophy he never did - take that, José. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
withnail316 Posted March 9, 2017 Share Posted March 9, 2017 Excellent season, well done! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
noikeee Posted March 10, 2017 Author Share Posted March 10, 2017 January 2018 - Pre-season transfers I decided to be rather conservative, and a wild wage budget that nearly tripled in size, was largely unused - I'm currently spending only about half of it. Meanwhile, I gambled a little by letting attacking midfielder Advaldo's contract run out, despite the fact he was playing pretty well. I figured since he was 31, and now we had gotten ourselves promoted, I could get a younger upgrade instead. I felt a new goalkeeper was a pretty urgent upgrade despite 2 very good seasons from Matías Quintana in goal. This lad looks good and experienced, just what we need as an unfancied side that just got promoted. Not to be confused with Valencia's Enzo Pérez. I had this transfer lined up for months as somehow this guy was lost in the Uruguayan lower leagues. We seem to hire a WBR every year, yet Marcelo Gamarra holds on to his place - perhaps not anymore with the arrival of Vargas? We'll see... Not our most exciting signing, he's meant to be a reliable experienced backup at the base of midfield. So we hired an Enzo Pérez and a Renzo Pérez. That is totally not confusing at all. I quite fancy a midfielder who can finish - either as AM/A on our plan A, or CM/A on our plan B. Advaldo's direct replacement as AMC, and the player I'm gambling the highest wages on. I've got big hopes for this Colombian wizard. New pacey forward, I think we'll have a lot more space to exploit here in the top division as teams won't be scared to attack us, so I need quick lads upfront. This means our squad now looks like this: Whilst I am expecting a few signings to walk into the team here, certainly Salgueiro (GK), Muñoz (AMC) and E. Pérez (DC), it's not a giant upgrade as I kept the core of the lot who got us promoted. The friendlies as usual tell us nothing. The Opening Stage (Apertura) kickstarts right at the beginning of February, I'm not so sure just how far we can go here, I expect perhaps a bit of punching above our weight for a while until the other teams figure out we can be dangerous. Nevertheless the goal is to steer clear of relegation. Personally, whilst so far I have only been vaguely linked to the Atenas de San Carlos job a few months ago (they got relegated to the division we were in last year), I've gotten a pretty handsome upgrade in reputation from 10% to 30% and am now starting to look out for potential moves - but I want to at least finish Apertura before doing so, and test out this squad at this level. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
andychar Posted March 10, 2017 Share Posted March 10, 2017 I love the idea that Mourinho was watching the Uruguay second division thinking "Damn he's catching up already!". Great idea and I look forward to seeing just how close you can get. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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